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The New Graphics Whores: Bit.Trip Beat is Gorgeous, But Retro Style Does Not Equate Quality

A strange thing happened to me between downloading Bit.Trip Beat and beating its first boss. While delighting in its vivid color, laughing at its signature character leaving rainbows in his wake across digital space, and letting its infectious chiptune beats colonize my brain, I realized that I wasn’t having any fun. That’s fine — I’m a firm believer in the fact that a game doesn’t need to be fun to be good — but I was expecting to have fun. I wanted to have fun. I was engaged by it, but not in a good way. I found the game to be overbearing and stressful. Then it hit me: Bit.Trip Beat is a bad game.

Building A Better(?) Controller

If there's any one manufacturer I've come to trust with my Wii accessories, it's Nyko. They seem to be tackling each and every problem I've had with the Wii's unique and ubiquitous controller in order of frustration level to (so far) fantastic results. After the frantic Wii launch, gamers worldwide complained about having to change the remote's AA batteries several times while playing Zelda, so Nyko released their Charge Station and I haven't needed AA batteries since. Gamers began choking themselves on the cord between the remote and nunchuck, so Nyko released their Kama wireless nunchuck. Everybody pretty much hated Nintendo's official Wii Zapper plastic shell, so Nyko released the much more sturdy and comfortable Perfect Shot pistol shell. (They've also released a wireless sensor bar, wireless classic controller, rechargable battery pack for the balance board, and other add-ons)

For their next trick, Nyko decided to redesign the Wii remote itself. Is it more aesthetically pleasing? Lord, no. Is it better? Maybe... it does offer some really sweet new functionality. Introducing the Wand:

This Week in Shrieking Annoyances

I really like Camelot. Even though franchises like Hot Shots Golf and Shining Force have been stolen from them and shoved into the hands of less-competent developers, they can still put out a mean golf game. Knowing this, I had GameFly send me a copy of We Love Golf for the Wii, which is essentially this generations version of Mario Golf, sans Mario.

Now let me tell you why I want Camelot to suffer.

We Love Golf is essentially an expanded version of the Wii Sports' golfing portion; it's bigger, prettier, and there's about a hundred more things to do. Just like in Wii Sports, the club control is a little awkward, and the backswing doesn't remotely resemble anything you'd do with a real golf club--but it doesn't take more than a few minutes to figure out all the quirks.

Since We Love Golf screams a tutorial at you through the Wiimote on every stroke, Camelot must have ingored that last, vital fact.

about the blogger

John Constantine, our superhero, was raised by birds and then attended Penn State University. He is currently working on a novel about a fictional city that exists only in his mind. John has an astonishingly extensive knowledge of Scientology. Ultimately he would like to learn how to effectively use his brain. He continues to keep Wu-Tang's secret to himself.

Derrick Sanskrit is a self-professed geek in a variety of fields including typography, graphic design, comic books, music and cartoons. As a professional hipster graphic designer, his recent clients have included Nerve, Pitchfork and MoCCA, among others.

Amber Ahlborn - artist, writer, gamer and DigiPen survivor, she maintains a day job as a graphic artist. By night Amber moonlights as a professional Metroid Fanatic and keeps a metal suit in the closet just in case. Has lived in the state of Washington and insists that it really doesn't rain as much as everyone says it does.

Nadia Oxford is a housekeeping robot who was refurbished into a warrior when the world's need for justice was great. Now that the galaxy is at peace (give or take a conflict here or there), she works as a freelance writer for various sites and magazines. Based in Toronto, Nadia prizes the certificate from the Ministry of Health declaring her tick and rabies-free.

Bob Mackey is a grad student, writer, and cyborg, who uses the powerful girl-repelling nanomachines mad science grafted onto his body to allocate time towards interests of the nerd persuasion. He believes that complaining about things on the Internet is akin to the fine art of wine tasting, but with more spitting into buckets.

Joe Keiser has a programming degree from Johns Hopkins University, a tiny apartment in Brooklyn, and a fake toy guitar built in the hollowed-out shell of a real guitar. He writes about games and technology for a variety of outlets. One day he will stop doing this. The day after that, police will find his body under a collapsed pile of (formerly neatly alphabetized) collector's edition tchotchkes.

Cole Stryker is an American freelance writer living in York, England, where he resides with his archeologist wife. He writes for a travel company by day and argues about pop culture on the internet by night. Find him writing regularly here and here.

Peter Smith is like the lead character of Irwin Shaw's The 80-Yard Run, except less athletic. He considers himself very lucky to have this job. But it's a little premature to take "jack-off of all trades" off his resume. Besides writing, travelling, and painting houses, Pete plays guitar in a rock trio called The Aye-Ayes. He calls them a 'power pop' band, but they generally sound more like Motorhead on a drinking binge.